In Two Straight Lines in Rain or Shine
by Oracle Glass
Summary: On that barren dustball known as Budapest, Firefly picks up an odd pair of passengers. Gen, but Clint/Natasha if you squint. But you don't have to squint hard.


The man is a little package of tense, and the red-haired woman has...well, she has the same look on her face as River sometimes gets, right when she's about to do something at her highest range of inexplicable. The rest of the crew is hovering in the doorway at the top of the gangplank, looking various shades of stoic, confused, nervous, and pissed-off (well, that's Jayne) but River, standing at Mal's side out in the open, is calm as a windless day. It's eerie, especially after the fit she'd pitched to get them all here, running through the corridor screaming at the top of her lungs. Something about a dancer and the bad, bloody dance, which is not the terminology you want to be woken up out of a sound sleep with. She wouldn't hush until Mal had agreed to slightly divert course, and now they're here on this dustball moon known to the maps and the lowest, just-scraping-by traders, as Budapest.

Mal told everyone that he wouldn't have come if he hadn't figured they could offload some spare goods unsold from their last job. Not that anybody believed him, but a man's got to keep his hard-nosed reputation up.

So they're here, with Serenity listing a little in the soft earth, and face to face with two strangers who are staring right back at them, just as confused. Looking at the woman, Mal has a feeling in the pit of his stomach about what might have been causing River's urgency. She's pale as pale, her pointed little chin quivering as if she's about to blow to pieces. The man next to her looks capable and protective, but underneath it all Mal can detect a strain, as if he's about to come to the end of his abilities, and knows it. River, he suspects, has gotten them all here on a rescue mission, which is just like her and no doubt going to cost them all money, time, and probably a little bit of their sanity by the time they're through. Of course, how she came to know that this woman would be here is uncanny and against the laws of nature, but hell, that's River, no two ways about it. He'd be worried if she were otherwise.

River steps forward, and the red-haired woman blinks and seems to focus suddenly, like she's just noticed their presence. They're tiny things, River and the woman both, although there's some muscle under the shapeless grey clothing Red wears, which looks like it might fall off her if it weren't for the double-wrapped belt keeping things in place. Her companion, grubby in torn coveralls and boots that have seen better days, has an expression on his face a lot like the one Simon gets, where he's not sure which way the cat will jump, and is keeping all options in reserve. He's also got his hand casually near a low-slung weapon of some kind, but that's no concern. Mal would, in his place, and Jayne's got Vera on standby should things get to a ruckus. As long as nobody's shooting, everyone can be as wary as makes them feel better.

River and Red are staring at each other. Red's fingers are twitching in some sort of rhythm against her thigh, fingers tapping. River seems oddly hesitant, now that she's face to face with this person she seemingly was in such a hurry to get to. In a tiny, questioning voice, she says,

"Side by side on gurneys, the room was red for revolutions. Doctors and heart's blood. But how did you know the dancer from the dance?"

Red freezes, stock-still, and the man next to her twitches, ever so slightly. He steps closer to Red - pure reflex, that - and Mal decides it's time to speed up the unfolding of whatever the hell's happening before things get out of hand. With over-deliberate casualness, as if they're all meeting at a dance instead of in the middle of a pile of dirt, he says, "River, want to introduce us to your friends? You went through a lot to get us here, after all."

River's head cocks and, in the quick voice she uses when the associations are bad, chatters, "_In an old house in Paris, all covered in vines, lived twelve little girls in two straight lines..._"

She trails off, but Red replies, her voice husky and accented.

"_In two straight lines, they broke their bread, and brushed their teeth,_"

They finish in unison. "And went to bed."

Mal can feel how hard the crew is listening, behind him. In fact, he's pretty sure he can guess what Jayne is muttering under his breath right now. Red's companion is spooked, too. In a cautious tone, he says, "'Tash, you doing ok, here? What's the story?"

"Hurts to talk about it if you go at it straight on, Barton," says Red, her voice tart. "You have to go at it in a circle, sneak up behind it so you can get a hand on it before it bites you." River nods as if she's just said something that made sense. But evidently Barton's heard it before, because he sighs, moves his hand away from his gun and offers it to Mal to shake.

"Clint Barton. And Natasha. I guess you've got one too, huh?"

"Got one which now?"

Barton jerks his head at River. "Gal with a penchant for secrecy, weapons and crazy talk?"

"Oh," says Mal. "I guess we do, at that."

* * *

He takes them on board when they're done selling off a few crates of machine parts (sad to see how these paltry offerings are snapped up by the traders of Budapest). For one, he's pretty sure River won't leave them any other choice. For two, Barton has a quick, private word with him. He offers Mal a grubby envelope full of currency.

"I've been trying to get us out of here for the past two weeks," he says quietly. "Money wasn't the issue, it's the fact that the few people with transportation refused to let Tasha on board. Man tried to grab her and she broke his arm for him, in front of a group of townies, and now they've all been gabbling about how dangerous she is."

Mal accepts the money, and figures the explanation will do, for now. Having two strangers on board makes him edgy, but they're paying passengers now. And something about the expression on the woman's face, and the way Barton seems to be asking for help without being able to bring himself to say the words...well, he understands. So he bites down on the impulse to tell them to get the hell gone, pockets the money, and determines to figure out more about the pair before long. Charity is one thing, keeping the crew safe is another. Worst comes to worst, they'll dump them off at the next habitable spot, whether it be border town or metropolis.

"One question. Anybody after you? Do I have to worry about being noticed by anybody with a grudge or a powerful desire to track you two down?"

"No. I'd know. We'd know. I arranged a plausible accident. They think we're both dead."

"River was...sought out. They can be persistent, and we're in no position to be anything more than anonymous dots in these backwater worlds. Nobody after you, you swear it?"

Barton returns his gaze unflinchingly. "I swear it."

Mal exhales.

"Can you keep her in check? We do ok with River, most days, but she's been known to be a touch unpredictable at times."

Barton nods. "We get by. As long as nobody gets up in her face, she's good. That happens, I can't promise much."

Mal shakes his head. "I got a good crew here, none of that type. Well, there's Jayne, but he's gotten much politer since River stabbed him."

Barton's eyebrow goes up. "I can see as how that might be an effective method of training a man."

* * *

Neither of the two have much luggage. Barton has a battered duffel and Red...Natasha...has a small leather satchel. Both of them have seen a lot of wear, and the leather satchel looks like it's been too close to a fire at one point. Inara takes charge of River and her new best friend and bustles them off to living quarters. Once they're settled, Mal sits everyone around the galley table for some discussion.

Jayne is grumbling under his breath. "'Nother goldarn crazy woman on board. This one better not stab me, Mal. That's final." Natasha seemingly takes no offense, and instead smiles at him suddenly, bright and cheerful. Jayne visibly recoils. Barton eyes him, and hides a small grin behind an upraised hand. Mal is fairly certain the man has Jayne assessed down to every last particular, and isn't worrying about him.

Inara, ever the diplomat, breaks the silence with some smalltalk.

"Have you two been on Budapest long?"

Barton shakes his head in the negative. "Couple of months, for me, anyway. Tasha's been there a little longer."

"Barton's been my guard dog for seven weeks and four days," says Natasha primly. Now that she's settled down, she seems a trifle more lucid on the average than River, if still prone to occasional flights of crazy. "Of course, it's a big change, since he was trying to kill me at first."

Like that. Every eye at the table is suddenly fixed on Barton, who doesn't seem too distressed by her pronouncement.

"That was then." He looks around at the circle of disapproving faces, and turns a little red. "Didn't do it, did I? Obviously."

"Why would you want to be killing a stranger? What'd she ever do to you?" Kaylee is accusatory.

"Oh, I can answer that," says Natasha. "I was killing people for money. My hat is black, and Clint's is snowy white. Well, maybe it's a little grey now. Dirt gets in, hard to wash it off."

"That's not quite the whole story, Tasha," protests Clint, but she continues, cutting him off. "'The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him.' The truth is, I'm a killer and Clint was my justice."

Clint puts his face in his hands. "You promised you'd stop quoting Dostoyevsky, Tasha. It just makes everybody irritable."

"So," asks Kaylee, "You were assassinating people?" Her voice is shaded with fear, and Mal realizes he may be poking at some old wounds of hers by letting these people on board.

Tasha smiles across the table at Kaylee. It's a little world-weary, nothing like the terrifying grimace she had directed at Jayne a few minutes ago. "It's okay. I didn't know what else I could do. Barton was sent to put me down. He made a different call. And I realized I could make a different one too."

Kaylee returns the smile, a little timidly. "Just...don't get a notion to resurrecting your old career, now. I keep a big pipe wrench under my hammock."

River leans on her brother's shoulder and sighs. "I'm glad for you, Simon," she tells him. "Natasha could have used a brother." He smiles down at her, surprised at her sentiment.

"It's okay," says Natasha again. "Someone came along eventually."

The look she and Clint exchange is so intimate that Mal gets squirmy seeing it. He thumps his hand on the table, breaking the moment and getting everyone's attention.

"Barton, Zoe, stay here for a minute. Everybody else, clear out."

The room clears. River is promising a tour of the ship to Natasha. As she passes Mal, he hears her include air ducts and service tunnels in the list of sights. Perfect.

****  
Zoe had been listening to the conversation silently, braced in the doorway a few steps back from the rest of them gathered around the table. Now, she stepped forwards and takes a seat, looking at Barton with a level gaze.

"Bounty hunter?"

Barton shakes his head. "Sniper. Can't talk too much about it. Let's say...closer to private security. She slipped into one of the most highly guarded offices on..." he catches himself, "on a...certain planet. Killed a high-level diplomat. Ghosted away without leaving a trace."

"And yet, you found her."

"She's good. I'm good too. Anybody can see she's been fucked over twelve different ways. Got her head scrambled somehow. Bad dreams. Occasional tendency towards crazy." His voice grows slightly husky with suppressed emotion. "I could have killed her from a distance, dropped her from a mile away. But...I couldn't. I'd been on her trail for too long. I got to know her too well."

"I think that's the question I'm driving at," says Zoe. "It seems like you've slipped your leash as well. Are they hunting you?"

The obvious question, and the one Mal had asked earlier. Unsurprising that it would be weighing on Zoe's mind as well.

"I swore to your captain that we are not being pursued," says Barton flatly. "Tasha may be a mite strange from time to time, but she's one of the best I've ever seen. She'd know, and take care of it. And I'm no slowpatch, myself. We'd know if they were after us."

"So what's your plan? How far did you talk the Captain into taking you?"

"He did pay fare, Zoe" protests Mal. "It's not like I got completely sweet-talked."

Zoe looks amused. "For someone who hates taking in strays, you sure do have a propensity for finding them."

"Can we stay? At least for a little while?" Barton must realize he sounds as if he's on the verge of pleading, and halts, balling up his fists in front of him on the table. "I'm sorry. I mean...if you'll have us, till we can get our feet under us, I'd appreciate it. We can work, in exchange for room and board.

Zoe looks over at Mal, her face impassive. "There's that job on Ashfall you were thinking about. We were going to pass on it because we didn't have enough manpower. Two more would make it workable."

"Let me think on it, Barton. We're a small ship, small crew. We'll figure it out before we get to Marshall, at any rate. Three days or thereabouts."

Barton nods and stands. "Fair enough."

* * *

Mal knows Serenity intimately. Wash did. Kaylee does. But none of them have found this little spot at the intersection of two ventilation tubes, where there's just enough room to sit cross-legged if you're a light-boned woman, built for dancing. River and Natasha are sitting there, side by side. Every once in a while, a draft of air comes traveling across them, floating their hair, raising goosebumps.

Nestled in the heart of the ship, they are peaceful. The ship shudders as they lift off the ground, a high-pitched clatter changing to a deep-throated hum as they break atmo. Serenity enfolds them, a small bubble lost in the vast darkness of space.

River smiles, light in her eyes. Natasha returns the smile. They don't talk. There's nothing at all they need to say.


End file.
